The headline today in the Nassau Guardian newspaper blasted “Elderly Woman Shot at Home” during a robbery. Another front page story involved an unrelated but even more deadly title “Men Charged with Murder.”
These headlines are hardly rare. Two weeks ago, a U.S. crew member was shot dead during a robbery in downtown Nassau. You can read about that crime and many others against cruise passengers in Nassau here.
The U.S. State Department has issued at least three “critical” warnings to travelers of the high homicide rate in the Bahamas, which is many, many times greater than the murder rate in Los Angeles for example.
Cruise lines are complaining to government representatives about cruise passengers being robbed. And there is talk about warning cruise passengers not to leave the cruise ships when they dock in Nassau.
Crimes are hardly limited to Bahamians killing and robbing other Bahamians.
Last week two armed men robbed 20 patron of a downtown bar at gun point of their money and valuables. Most of the people robbed were tourists.
The increasing crime trend is occurring at a time when cruise passengers are spending less money in the Bahamas. Cruise passengers now spend around $65 a day while ashore down from around $84 a few years ago.
For country where well over 50% of its Gross National Produce comes from tourists, the Bahamas is facing a tough situation. Cruise passengers are spending less and are more likely to be robbed or shot while on vacation.
A local newspaper bluntly reports The Government Has Lost the War on Crime.
We have been involved in two cases involving shore excursions where over 30 cruise passengers were robbed at gunpoint in the Bahamas, as well as young women sexually assaulted in Nassau and on cruise ships in port there.
Disney recently sailed its Disney Dream with a child molester aboard, rather than report the crime timely to U.S. authorities, because it knew that the Bahamas police which can’t control crime on their own island would do nothing about a crime on a Bahamian cruise ship.